Young Adult Books (2018)

The Young Adult Book Shortlist from 2018 is below – and the WINNER, with 39.8% of the vote was …

‘Scythe’

‘A Moment Comes’ by Jennifer Bradbury

‘A Moment Comes’ by Jen­nifer Brad­bury

As the par­ti­tion of India nears in 1947 bring­ing vio­lence even to Jaland­har, Tariq, a Mus­lim, finds him­self caught between his for­bid­den inter­est in Anupreet, a Sikh girl, and Mar­garet, a British girl whose affec­tion for him might help with his dream of study­ing at Oxford.

‘The Trap’ by Alan Gibbons

‘The Trap’ by Alan Gib­bons

Ter­ror­ism, hero­ism and every­thing in between … THETRAP is a teen thriller about espi­onage, a miss­ing broth­er and the ever-rag­ing war on ter­ror by mil­lion-copy-sell­ing author, Alan Gib­bons. MI5 agent, Kate, receives a tip-off about an asset, who seems too good to be true. Amir and Nasi­ma are try­ing to make friends at their new school but strug­gling to keep a ter­ri­ble secret. A group of jihadists are plan­ning some­thing. And behind it all stands Majid. Broth­er. Son. Hero. Ter­ror­ist. Span­ning Iraq, Syr­ia and Eng­land, THETRAP grap­ples with one of the great­est chal­lenges of our time.

‘The Red Pencil’ by Andrea Davis Pinkney

Final­ly, Ami­ra is twelve. Old enough to wear a toob, old enough for new respon­si­bil­i­ties. And maybe old enough to go to school in Nyala — Amira’s one true dream.

But life in her peace­ful Sudanese vil­lage is shat­tered when the Jan­jaweed arrive. The ter­ri­fy­ing attack­ers rav­age the town and unleash unspeak­able hor­rors. After she los­es near­ly every­thing, Ami­ra needs to dig deep with­in her­self to find the strength to make the long jour­ney — on foot — to safe­ty at a refugee camp. Her days are tough at the camp, until the gift of a sim­ple red pen­cil opens her mind — and all kinds of pos­si­bil­i­ties.

New York Times best­selling and Coret­ta Scott King Award-win­ning author Andrea Davis Pinkney’s pow­er­ful verse and Coret­ta Scott King Award-win­ning artist Shane W. Evans’s breath­tak­ing illus­tra­tions com­bine to tell an inspir­ing tale of one girl’s tri­umph against all odds.

‘Scythe’ by Neal Shusterman

‘Scythe’ by Neal Shus­ter­man

Thou shalt kill.

A world with no hunger, no dis­ease, no war, no mis­ery. Human­i­ty has con­quered all those things, and has even con­quered death. Now scythes are the only ones who can end life — and they are com­mand­ed to do so, in order to keep the size of the pop­u­la­tion under con­trol.

Cit­ra and Rowan are cho­sen to appren­tice to a scythe — a role that nei­ther wants. These teens must mas­ter the “art” of tak­ing life, know­ing that the con­se­quence of fail­ure could mean los­ing their own.

‘On the Edge of Gone’ by Corinne Duyvis

‘On the Edge of Gone’ by Corinne Duyvis

Jan­u­ary 29, 2035.

That’s the day the comet is sched­uled to hit — the big one. Denise and her moth­er and sis­ter, Iris, have been assigned to a tem­po­rary shel­ter near their home­town of Ams­ter­dam to wait out the blast, but Iris is nowhere to be found, and at the rate Denise’s drug-addict­ed moth­er is going, they’ll nev­er reach the shel­ter in time.

Then a last-minute encounter leads them to some­thing bet­ter than a tem­po­rary shel­ter: a gen­er­a­tion ship that’s sched­uled to leave Earth behind and col­o­nize new worlds after the comet hits. But each pas­sen­ger must have a prac­ti­cal skill to con­tribute. Denise is autis­tic and fears that she’ll nev­er be allowed to stay. Can she obtain a spot before the ship takes flight? What about her moth­er and sis­ter?

When the future of the human race is at stake, whose lives mat­ter most?

‘Flame in the Mist’ by Renée Ahdieh

‘Flame in the Mist’ by Renée Ahdieh

The only daugh­ter of a promi­nent samu­rai, Mariko has always known she’d been raised for one pur­pose and one pur­pose only: to mar­ry. Nev­er mind her cun­ning, which rivals that of her twin broth­er, Ken­shin, or her skills as an accom­plished alchemist. Since Mariko was not born a boy, her fate was sealed the moment she drew her first breath.

So, at just sev­en­teen years old, Mariko is sent to the impe­r­i­al palace to meet her betrothed, a man she did not choose, for the very first time. But the jour­ney is cut short when Mariko’s con­voy is vicious­ly attacked by the Black Clan, a dan­ger­ous group of ban­dits who’ve been hired to kill Mariko before she reach­es the palace.

The lone sur­vivor, Mariko nar­row­ly escapes to the woods, where she plots her revenge. Dressed as a peas­ant boy, she sets out to infil­trate the Black Clan and hunt down those respon­si­ble for the tar­get on her back. Once she’s with­in their ranks, though, Mariko finds for the first time she’s appre­ci­at­ed for her intel­lect and abil­i­ties. She even finds her­self falling in love — a love that will force her to ques­tion every­thing she’s ever known about her fam­i­ly, her pur­pose, and her deep­est desires.